1890"By my hilt! no. There was little Robby Withstaff, and Andrew Salblaster, and Wat Alspaye, who broke the neck of the German. Mon Dieu! what men they were! Take them how you would, at long butts or short, hoyles, rounds, or rovers, better bowmen never twirled a shaft over their thumb-nails." — Arthur Conan Doyle, The White Company, Chapter 22.

1846But these islands, undisturbed for years, relapsed into their previous obscurity; and it is only recently that anything has been known concerning them. Once in the course of a half century, to be sure, some adventurous rover would break in upon their peaceful repose. and astonished at the unusual scene, would be almost tempted to claim the merit of a new discovery. — Herman Melville, Typee, Chapter 1.

A vagabond, a tramp, an unsteady, restless person, one who by habit doesn't settle down or marry.

The Mars Exploration Rovers will act as robot geologists while they are on the surface of Mars.NASA site.

Position in Australian Rules football, one of three of a team's followers, who follow the ball around the ground. Formerly a position for short players, rovers in professional leagues are frequently over 183 cm (6').

(croquet) A ball which has passed through all the hoops and would go out if it hit the stake but is continued in play; also, the player of such a ball.

1719The first was this: our ship making her course towards the Canary Islands, or rather between those islands and the African shore, was surprised in the grey of the morning by a Turkish rover of Sallee, who gave chase to us with all the sail she could make. — Daniel Defoe, Robinnson Crusoe, Chapter 2.

Holland

Yet Pompey the Great deserveth honour more justly for scouring the seas, and taking from the rovers 846 sail of ships.

This verb conjugates as a first-group verb ending in -er. The forms that would normally end in *-v, *-vs, *-vt are modified to f, s, t. This verb has a stressed present stem ruev distinct from the unstressed stem rov, as well as other irregularities. Old French conjugation varies significantly by date and by region. The following conjugation should be treated as a guide.